Soulseek Free Music Download

Soulseek is a file sharing network, one part Kazza and one part MySpace. It operates on a peer to peer network basis but allows users to create profiles and “meet” other people. Unlike Kazaa, Soulseek is 100% pop-up ad free, geared toward indie music, and you can download entire albums.

The network was created by Nir Abdel, one the original Napster programmers.

Disclaimer

Although Soulseek and other P2P programs are not illegal, downloading and sharing copywritten material is. LoveToKnow does not condone the use of P2P programs for illegal purposes. Please use these programs responsibly and share only Free Music and other freely-distributable media. Learn more about Downloading Legal Music.

How Does It Work?

Basic Downloading

The Soulseek website will guide you through the initial set-up process (for questions, check out their Guide for Dummies page). Once you are set-up, you can begin searching for music by artist/album name. You’ll see a list of users from whom you can download what you’re looking for – and you’ll also be able to see who has a queue of people waiting to download from them. The search results in gray mean you’re have to get in line, the search results in black mean you’re good to go immediately. Once the download is complete, the album will be saved in a file on your computer, created during the set-up process. Check out the FAQ page for advice on organizing your music and making it accessible to other users.

The emphasis at Soulseek is on sharing. Put your albums on your computer, make them available to other users, and all will be well. If you fail to share, you might find other users blocking you from downloading their catalog. If you’re good at sharing, you might find yourself with special downloading privileges, letting you jump to the front of the line for popular downloads.

Rooms

You can narrow your search results by only looking for files in the various chat rooms on the site. The rooms are genre specific and exist not only to help you find what you are looking for faster, but also to chat with others fans of your favorite music. There are a few rules for good behavior within the chat rooms – like, don’t pop into a room and ask for an album because you’re too lazy to search for it yourself – it won’t win you any friends. The FAQ page will give you a few pointers on joining the community. Once you become familiar with the network, you may choose to do things like make some of your albums only available to members of a certain chat room.

You can also set up a profile of yourself, with some general “getting to know you” information, to help people with similar interests find you (and you them).

The chat rooms are another place to gain downloading privileges – do something nice for someone, and they can grant you some of their privileges.

Uploading

When you get to know some users, you might to allow them to upload directly to your computer. If your friend hears something great and wants you to check it out, he can upload it to your computer without waiting around for you to download it from him. Obviously, you should only grant this right to people you absolutely trust to not abuse it, unless you want lots of unsolicited demos, not to mention viruses.

How Do I Get Soulseek?

Download Soulseek on www.slsknet.org

Things To Remember

• To get the most out of Soulseek, take some time to organize the music on your computer so it accessible to other users.

• Don’t save all your music in one big “music” file – have each album in an individual folder. When you are downloading from people, make sure they haven’t made this mistake either, or else you too will end up with their entire music collection.

• Aside from sharing your music, another way to get downloading privileges is to make a donation to Soulseek. Every $5 you donate gets you one month of privileges.

Related Music Links

• Downloading Music - File Guide
• Free Music
• Kazaa Free Music Download
• Limewire Free Music Download
• Listen to Music Online